Flexible dieting and why it may be right for you

Published 6:33 pm, Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Dieticians suggest eating fresh whole foods and fruits and vegetables as a way to avoid weight gain.

Dieticians suggest eating fresh whole foods and fruits and vegetables as a way to avoid weight gain.

Flexible dieting and why it may be right for you

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By Erik DeLaRosa

I do not like the word diet, but let’s face it we all use it. Sometimes when we “diet” we develop this mental concept of “I can’t have it.” When someone tells us we can’t have something, we usually want it more.

The most important tool in weight loss is making sure you are in a calorie deficit. A calorie deficit just means you have to burn more calories than you take in daily. You can’t cut calories and literally starve yourself. This makes you feel restricted, very mentally and physically unhealthy, or you will binge and eat everything. If you do lose weight like that, once you get to your goal, you do what? You go right back into the old lifestyle of eating whatever you want to eat and you will eventually gain all the weight back. Those diets don’t work. You have to eat and you have to be able to enjoy some of your favorite foods and enjoy life. There is a nutrition plan out there that allows this called flexible dieting.

I started doing flexible dieting five weeks ago and it seems to be working for me especially from a mental perspective. Flexible dieting (commonly known as If It Fits Your Macros) is when you track your macronutrients to get to the goal that you want to achieve. Macronutrients or macros are made up of three main components. These components are; protein, fats and carbohydrates. Instead of counting calories, you count your macros. These macros have a caloric value. One gram of protein equals 4 calories, 1 gram of fat equals nine calories and one gram of carbohydrates equals four calories. Normal dieters track calories. For example, eating 2,000 calories a day, you track everything you eat until you reach 2,000 calories a day and then you stop.

Flexible dieters track the macronutrients. For example 180g of protein, 76g of fat and 149g of carbohydrates equals 2,000 calories. Counting macros is a more effective way to change body composition rather than just ‘losing weight.’ When you just lose weight, you can lose fat or muscle or both so the goal is to hang onto the lean muscle and lose the body fat. Even though I do flexible dieting, the majority of the time I eat whole non-processed foods. By tracking everything that enters my mouth, I stop spinning my wheels and take control over how and when I reach my goals.

Tracking, whether it’s your macros or calories, is hands down the most effective way to change your body. Occasionally I want something that I normally wouldn’t have like bread because it’s processed or frozen yogurt after a gym session. What I do is take the macros I was going to eat using my chicken and rice and swap the macros from the meal I was planning on eating. This helps with my social life as well. I can enjoy going to dinner or going to get a treat and still stay on top of my goals so long as I keep track of what I am eating.

You have to plan with flexible dieting. In my opinion to have options requires even more planning on your part. If you want to constantly change what you are going to eat, then you need to plan so you know it will fit in your macros. If you want to get started on flexible dieting, you have to calculate your macros. You can do this by creating an account with at www.myfitnesspal.com or a similar website and buy a food scale. You will see on these websites, you have to weigh your food in ounces or grams. The food scale will do that for you and although food packaging tells you the weight, I have learned many times that it’s not correct by using a food scale.

Hope you enjoy this as much as I do. For the first time, I feel that flexible dieting has completely transformed what and how I eat and live my life. I like having the freedom to eat with family and friends and I am seeing great results and this is a sustainable lifestyle for me to stick with year round. I am an online nutrition and training coach. If you are interested in being set up with this type of plan, please email me at erikdelarosa@gmail.com and we can get started.